65

A fullen thing, whofe coarfenefs fuits the crowd;
Tho' young, unhandfome, tho' unhandsome, proud :
Thus, with the wanton, fome perverfely judge
All girls unhealthy but the Country drudge.
No foreign schemes make eafy Capio roam,
The man contented takes his Church at home;
Nay should fome Preachers, fervile bawds of gain,
Should fome new Laws, which like new fashions reign, 70
Command his faith to count Salvation ty'd
To vifit his, and vifit none befide,

He grants Salvation centers in his own,
And grants it centers but in his alone:

From youth to age he grafps the proffer'd dame, 75
And they confer his Faith, who give his Name:
So from the Guardian's hands, the Wards who live
Enthrall'd to Guardians, take the wives they give.
From all profeffions careless Airy flies,

For, all profeffions can't be good, he cries,
And here a fault, and there another views,

And lives unfix'd for want of heart to chufe.

So men, who know what fome loofe girls have done, For fear of marrying fuch, will marry none.

80

The Charms of all, obfequious Courtly ftrike; 85

On each he doats, on each attends alike;

And thinks, as diff'rent countries deck the dame,
The dreffes altering, and the fex the fame;
So fares Religion, chang'd in outward show,

But 'tis Religion ftill, where'er we go:

This blindness springs from an excess of light,
And men embrace the wrong to chuse the right.
But thou of force must one Religion own,
And only one, and that the Right alone.
To find that Right one, afk thy Rev'rend Sire;
Let him of his, and him of his enquire;
Tho' Truth and Falfhood feem as twins ally'd,
There's Eldership on Truth's delightful side,
Her feek with heed-who feeks the foundest First
Is not of No Religion, nor the worst.
T'adore, or fcorn an Image, or protest,
May all be bad; doubt wifely for the best;
'Twere wrong to fleep, or headlong run aftray;
It is not wand'ring to inquire the way.

On a large mountain, at the Bafis wide,
Steep to the top, and craggy at the fide,
Sits facred Truth enthron'd; and he, who means
To reach the fummit, mounts with weary pains,
Winds round and round, and ev'ry turn essays
Where fudden breaks refift the fhorter ways.

Yet labour fo, that, ere faint age arrive,
Thy fearching foul poffefs her Reft alive;
To work by twilight were to work too late,
And Age is twilight to the night of fate.
To will alone, is but to mean delay:

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100

105

110

115

To work at present is the ufe of day,

For man's employ much thought and deed remain,
High Thoughts the Soul, hard deeds the body strain :

And Myft'ries afk believing, which to View
Like the fair Sun, are plain, but dazzling too.
Be Truth, fo found, with facred heed poffeft,
Not Kings have pow'r to tear it from thy breast;
By no blank Charters harm they where they hate,
Nor are they Vicars, but the Hands of Fate.

120

Ah! fool and wretch, who let'ft thy foul be ty'd 125 To buman Laws! Or muft it fo be try'd?

Or will it boot thee, at the latest day,

When Judgment fits, and Justice asks thy plea,
That Philip that, or Greg'y taught thee this,
Or John or Martin? All may teach amifs:
For ev'ry contrary in each extream

130

This holds alike, and each may plead the fame.
Would't thou to Pow'r a proper duty fhew ?
'Tis thy first task the bounds of pow'r to know;
The bounds once paft, it holds the name no more, 135
Its nature alters, which it own'd before,

Nor were fubmiffion humbleness expreft,
But all a low Idolatry at best.

Pow'r from above fubordinately fpread,
Streams like a fountain from th' eternal head;
There, calm and pure the living waters flow,
But roar a Torrent or a Flood below;

Each flow'r, ordain'd the Margins to adorn,

Each native Beauty, from its roots is torn,

140

And left on Deferts, Rocks, and Sands, or toft 145 All the long travel, and in Ocean loft;

So fares the foul, which more that Pow'r reveres
Man claims from God, than what in God inheres.

NOTES.

This noble fimilitude, with which the Satire concludes, Dr. Parnell did not seem to understand; or was not able to exprefs it in its original force. Dr. Donne fays,

"As ftreams are, Pow'r is; those bleft flow'rs that dwell "At the rough ftreams calm head, thrive, and do well; "But having left their roots, and themselves given "To the streams tyrannous rage, alas, are driven "Through mills, rocks, and woods, and at last, almost "Confum'd in going, in the Sea are lost.

"So perish Souls," &c.

Dr. Donne exprefly compares power to ftreams: but the comparifon of fouls to flowers being only implied, Dr. Parnell overlooked that part; and so has hurt the whole thought, by making the flowers paffive; whereas the Original fays, they leave their roots, and give themselves to the fiream: that is, wilfully prefer human Authority to divine; and this makes them the object of his Satire; which they would not have been, were they irresistibly carried away, as the Imitation fuppofes.

R 4

SATIRE II.

STRE

R, though (I thank God for it) I do hate Perfectly all this town; yet there's one state In all ill things, fo excellently beft,

That hate towards them, breeds pity towards the reft.

Though Poetry, indeed, be such a fin,

As, I think, that brings Dearth and Spaniards in:
Though like the peftilence, and old-fashion'd love,
Ridlingly it catch men, and doth remove
Never, till it be starv'd out; yet their state

Is

poor, difarm'd, like Papifts, not worth hate. One (like a wretch, which at barre judg'd as dead, Yet prompts him which stands next, and cannot read,

And faves his life) gives Idiot Actors means, (Starving himself) to live by's labour'd scenes. As in fome Organs, Puppits dance above, And bellows pant below, which them do move. One would move love by rythmes; but witchcraft's charms

Bring not now their old fears, nor their old harms;